Notes finished-- now the Dated Notebooks

I have finished posting the 14 existing volumes of CSP's notes (Volume 10 being missing), and have started on the 9 dated notebooks. These are memo-sized pads, written in pencil, apparently more hastily that the carefully penned Notes volumes. I have started with number 7, written in 1942, because it takes up where Notes Volume 15 stopped.

These are not easy to read, but with practice I am now understanding about 90% of it. CSP is mainly interested in the war: his entry for 10-14-42 starts with "42 weeks of war." This is a recurring heading; I imagine at some point in 1943 it would have been too much effort to calculate; I wonder if he had ideas about how long it was going to last? As I scan these little books, I read bits here and there, but I haven't read them carefully yet. They seem easier to read on the website, enlarged a bit, than the originals, and perhaps I'll get through them some day, after I complete scanning the most important documents.

I was born just before the end of WW II, and in my earliest years, the war was a reverberating presence, always in the background, a huge, dramatic event that I missed completely. It is interesting to read CSP's view of these events, and to try to feel his reactions: fear, suspense and obsessive interest.

I reduced the size of his signature that appears at the top of each page and reorganized the heading so it takes up less screen-space. The new signature graphic needs a bit of cleaning in Photoshop. I'll try to do that before we leave this Sunday.